Starling Travel

I saw these pictures on Motion Burns The Mood, but they had labeled them, “Abandoned Amusement Park in New Orleans.” After some sleuthing, I finally found where this abandoned amusement park really was: Chippewa Lake Park in Ohio.

Here is a documentary exploring the park and comparing its abandoned decay to the beauty of its past.

There is something about a defunct amusement park that seems so appealing to me. I feel as if I could ride the rides all day long with no other people in line in front of me. Logically, I know that I couldn’t go on any of the rides, but still, I want to visit an abandoned amusement park, if only to FEEL as if I had it all to myself. It seems to appeal to the hermit side of me, wanting to create a place of fun just for myself, like Michael Jackson did with Neverland Ranch.

Unfortunately, you can’t visit the abandoned site of Chippewa Lake Park anymore. In 2009, it was demolished.

If you want to learn more, here are some more links:

• Google Maps – Chippewa Lake Park
• Forgotten Ohio – Chippewa Lake Park

When I was looking through my grandma’s old family photos, I found this one.

None of the people so eagerly approaching this bear are any of my ancestors, but my grandma was close enough to TAKE the photograph, so I can’t brag too loudly about how safe she might have been. Back in the 1940s and 1950s, visitors to Yellowstone park were allowed to approach and feed the grizzly bears. I wonder how many human injuries occurred before they changed that rule.

Now, when a grizzly bear wanders into an area of Yellowstone with lots of tourists, the rangers are right there to prevent encounters. Here’s a video of a grizzly bear at Old Faithful, chasing bison.

I LOVE how that video ends. He realizes that the grizzly is coming for him and he starts yelling, “Nope, no, no!” Then the video just STOPS! AWESOME!

I’ve seen bears in Yellowstone before and wrote about it here:

• Starling Travel – Yellowstone Grizzly Bear Photos
• Starling Travel – Video: Bear in Yellowstone

Here’s the video from our 2007 encounter:

It’s funny to me to see my videos and photos alongside the one from my grandma’s collection. Throughout the years, our family has visited Yellowstone many times and have enjoyed the wildlife there. It’s like I feel connected to her across the span of time and it has even bridged across death itself, creating a bond from beyond the grave.

This little trailer on KSL Classifieds broke my heart because it was already sold by the time I found it.

You can see the description and lots more pictures after the break: (Continue Reading…)

I found this homemade teardrop camper in KSL Classifieds and I was attracted to the bright yellow.

See their description and more photos after the break: (Continue Reading…)

For the first time in months, I want to drive for hours and plunk down some money on a cute little trailer I saw on KSL Classifieds.

Here is their description: (Continue Reading…)

I am THOROUGHLY disgusted with Trailer Life Magazine right now. I just got it in the mail last night and was excited by one of the articles on the cover. It was called Loaded & Light: 11 Fully Equipped Trailers.

I thought, “Yes! They’re finally showcasing some of the tiny trailers on the market today!” Unfortunately, it was not as I imagined.

Of the 11 trailers they showcased, only two of them were under 3000 pounds. Those two were just the “low-end” of some of the brands and neither one was pictured. Instead, they focused on 36-foot behemoths that “only” weight 6600 pounds.

Light? I don’t think that word means what you think it means…

Here is a REAL list of eleven loaded and light trailers: (Continue Reading…)

The incredibly funny Jenna Marbles is complaining about the kind of people who annoy her on airplanes. Be warned it’s laced with profanity…

I literally laughed when she smacked down the loud business cell phone talkers.

Hey, guess what? We’re in a small, enclosed space, so if you could just shut the BLEEP up, that would be fantastic! I mean, I know that you’re so BLEEPING important, and stuff like that. You’ve made that really clear, you know, but no one’s that important, like NOBODY. If Oprah was on this plane right now, she’d be kickin’ it.

I also liked the rant about the laptop loudies.

They have headphones in the front pocket. Put some on and STOP it!

Then, there are the armrest hogs of the world.

Oh, and line jumpers!

Get off your entitled high horse and get in line like everybody else!

All of this is EXACTLY why I don’t like to fly, but I love how she chilled out afterward.

I feel like half of the world’s disagreements could be solved by hugging a puppy for a little while.

In the end, airline travel feels like an unpleasant congress with strangers. The only reason we put up with it is because it turns a four-day drive into an eight-hour flight. When the four-day drive is in our own car with just us and we can stay every night in our tent trailer that feels like our own home, it’s a hard competition between the rudeness of the fellow fliers and the lazy enjoyment of a four-day drive.

Photo via: Müe, I feel your pain. by InfoMofo on Flickr

Ask A Mortician visited Savannah and she talks about its ghosts and famous graveyards. She usually talks about death and our inevitable mortality, so even on her vacation, she talks about her profession.

I love how she categorizes the city:

Savannah is no doubt a city of death. It saw battles in the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, and a yellow fever epidemic that wiped out a thousand people in a week. Geographically, it’s not that big. You can’t swing a dead cat without landing on some paved-over 200-year-old burial, but does being on all those dead people really necessarily ghosts and hauntings and angry spirits, or could the whole city just be a Momento Mori? A reminder that we, too, will die and while there are dead people underneath our feet, we’re alive. ALIVE!

When we were in Savannah, we didn’t have much time to take ghost tours. We were there with Mike’s family because his grandfather flew in WWII on a B-17 for the Mighty Eighth Air Force. The museum for that bomb group is in Savannah.

• National Museum of the Mighty Eighth Air Force

We spent a lot of time at that museum and they are currently in the process of restoring a B-17 to its former glory, so it proves to be an even BETTER museum once that is done.

I’d really like to revisit Savannah and see that museum again, but this time, I’d also like to take some home tours and ghost tours. Oh, and don’t forget the Savannah Candy Kitchen! How I loved those candied pecans! THAT is a perfect way to celebrate being ALIVE!

Sci Show investigates the Waitomo Caves in New Zealand, which glow a strange hue of blue. And the reason they do is because of weird glow worms!

New Zealand is one of those places that I really want to visit and when I do, I’ll be sure to see the Waitomo Caves. Until then, here is a video showing them in person.

It’s Judy Time visited Japan and while she was there, she showed us her makeup travel bag.

She started the video saying that she doesn’t like to over pack, and then she shows ALL the makeup she brought, which is more than even my every day set of makeup.

Here is the picture of all the products in my makeup travel bag.

The products are:

• L’Oreal Paris Double Extend Mascara
• Cover Girl Outlast All Day Lipcolor
• CoverGirl Ultimate Finish Liquid Powder Make Up
• Japonesque Go Curl Pocket Eyelash Curler
• Retractable Lip Brush
• The blusher, smudger and eyeshadow brush were from various brush sets. Here’s a comparable one from E.L.F.: e.l.f. Studio 11 Piece Brush Collection
• CoverGirl Perfect Point Plus Eyeliner
• Every season, Sephora comes out with a tiny flip palette that includes eyeshadow, blush and lip gloss. Here’s a link to a similar one to mine: SEPHORA Color Flip Makeup Palette

Here’s a closeup of that tiny Sephora palette.

That tiny makeup palette is the reason I’m able to pack all of my makeup in this tiny pencil bag.

Additionally, I pack all my hair accessories in that bag as well in the smaller zipper area.

After seeing everything that Judy packed for her Tokyo trip, I just laughed to myself. I have minimized my travel makeup to live in a tiny pencil bag with room for my hair accessories as well. It lives in my toiletry bag all the time, so I can be ready to go on a trip on a moment’s notice.

That is what travel is all about. I don’t want to have to stress out about whether I packed the right thing or not. All I want is to be able to throw some clothes in a bag and go!